We used to love food shopping before the current quarantine situation. Now that it’s hazardous to leave our front door, it’s not so much fun anymore. However, ordering through Instacart aside, we still like to browse the shelves and select certain groceries ourselves at the supermarket.
We just came from a trip to Publix where we spend nearly $300. On what, you ask? It cost almost $30 for the probiotic my GI doctor recommended rather than yogurt with its sugar and dairy content. As for the rest…
Meats – I bought ground beef and chicken breasts in case there’s a meat shortage with manufacturing plants shutting down due to illness. I’ll freeze them except for one pack of chicken to make soup. Oh, I bought bourbon salmon fillets for dinner tonight.
Fruits and Vegetables – Apples, bananas, berries, salads, other veggies, and an eggplant. This category is the hardest to keep in stock at our house.
Staples for the Pantry
Bisquick – Yay, I found it! The shelves were bare last time and I couldn’t even order it. Many of my FB friends shared recipes for homemade biscuit mix, but easy is better where I’m concerned. I found it on Amazon just this week and ordered a big box for an inflated price. Lo and behold! Publix had a few boxes in stock. I grabbed a small one to make pancakes (along with frozen blueberries) and a bigger one for my veggie egg bake dishes. Who knows when the one from Amazon will arrive? I still have packages being delivered from there and Walmart that I’d ordered a month ago. My new motto – Buy it when you see it.
Progresso Bread Crumbs – These were in short supply and I had just opened my last one at home. I snatched this up.
Dairy – Cream cheese, eggs, Egg Beaters, shredded mozzarella. Plenty available.
Breads – I spied a fresh baked Challah and got that along with some mini blueberry muffins.
Cleaning Supplies – Another item I couldn’t find lately was All Free & Clear laundry detergent, so I’d bought an unknown brand online. Now I could see my favorite brand on the shelves so how could I resist? Also I had ordered Dawn dishwashing detergent online as it was another item I needed. Publix had it in stock so I got one to use when our current bottle runs out. And they had Scrubbing Bubbles! I scored one of these to help clean the shower. No Clorox wipes available but plenty of Clorox jugs. I passed them by as we have enough for now.
Paper Goods – I bought one two-pack of paper towels and one box of tissues. No TP but we don’t need it yet.
Specialty Items – We bought some other items like shelf stable puddings, dried cranberries in little boxes, mandarin oranges cups, etc. With hurricane season coming, it doesn’t hurt to stock up as we go along. We already have plenty of canned goods.
Most people wore masks, including the cashiers. We followed the arrows up and down the rows and tried to steer clear of anyone else, although that’s not always easy when the store is crowded.
And that was the haul for today. Then it was home to dump the bags in the front hallway that’s our staging area. Unpack the items onto our clothed dining room table. Wipe down the cold items and refrigerate. Dump clothes in washing machine. Drop ourselves into the shower. Finish disinfecting rest of items that don’t need refrigeration and let them sit for a day or two. Eat lunch. Get some rest!
Have your bills gone up at the grocery store? Do you stick strictly to a list or stock up as you see what’s available?
12 thoughts on “Cruising the Supermarket Aisles”
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Wow… I did our run yesterday. We only had $30 so I bought 5 lb bags of potatoes & sweet onions and other stuff, staying on budget which I never had to worry about before. The word “budget” was more like the Pirate’s Creed-kind of guidelines.
We’ve decided to go off meat after we finish what we bought at BJ’s. I get your Bisquick lol I’m that way about Hungry Jack. Making a lot from scratch these days and not ordering out is saving us a lot. I’m even starting to lose weight by cutting portions to conserve food. I splurged on Entenman’s BOGO pound cakes. When I got home, I needed a long nap.
We have a nice T-bone in the freezer we’ve been saving for May 3 (my birthday) and we’ll have a nice baked potato, frizzled onions & a veggie. For dessert? Lol Pound cake with a candle.
Sounds like you have the fixings for a lovely birthday dinner, Lois. You did good to stick to your budget!
My pantry is full for now. I want to have plenty for backup in case my family needs anything or the neighbors.
We take care of each other and share what we have. Love my family and friends.
That’s so generous, Sharon. It pays to have extra supplies these days anyway so you can stay home.
I placed my order online with Walmart. What I like is that they pick the produce from “the back” so you get it before it gets put out for ‘live’ shoppers to pick over. What we try to do is keep a good working list so I can ‘browse’ the website for things we might need. No serious impulse buying, and someone comes to the car and puts it in the back. Under 5 minutes. No contact. I follow the Washington Post’s guidelines for how to handle everything–at least that author is an assistant professor of exposure and assessment science and director of the Healthy Buildings Program at Harvard, so he’s a better source (IMHO) than a surgeon who’s trying to turn a kitchen into an operating theater. Very little stress. In fact, I’m considering keeping up with online ordering and pickup even after we can go back in the stores. I don’t like grocery shopping at all. And shopping on line gives me a running total of what I’ve spent (less than if I’d gone in person) so I can adjust if needed.
I didn’t know that about Walmart orders so thanks for sharing. It’s sometimes hard to tell a buyer what to get if you want to make a specific dish or have an alternative if those ingredients are not available. I usually go to the store with several options depending on what I can get.
The Walmart app will give you choices to substitute if they’re out of stock. This will show up before you pick up your order, so you can adjust as needed.
Food prices have definitely gone up. Partly it’s because the stores here aren’t putting many things on sale. We have a good amount of meat in the freezer so I’ve only had to pick up a couple of packs of chicken. I’m picking up extra on things like eggs and bread that can stay in the fridge for a while since we’re trying do just do a trip to the supermarket every other week with a trip to the farmstand for fresh produce in between. I try really hard to stick to my list and not spend more than we need to.
It’s nice that you have a farmstand handy. We run out of fresh fruits and veggies once a week. As for bread, that can be frozen if necessary.
I have two high risk children, because of this, we have been stocking up on non-perishables that I normally only stock up on for the winters here. When we lived in South Florida, we would stock up for hurricane season and not winter. (Publix was our favorite place to shop.) I haven’t been in an actual store, in a while, thankfully I had just shopped before we went into isolation. I have to do the Walmart pickup, and I’m completely at their mercy on shopping. I find this incredibly frustrating, I prefer to pick out my own things, especially when it’s fruits and veggies. We have received several bad fruits, think mold, yuck. Our farmer’s market hasn’t opened here yet. I grudgingly helped my youngest put in a bigger garden than I wanted, but not quite as big as he wanted. I haven’t canned anything in a while, but I have the supplies. If his garden is as successful as hopes, I will be teaching the children to can this summer.
It’s hard to let others shop for you, especially if you need substitutions when some items aren’t available. We’ve been going to the store wearing masks and gloves once a week, mostly as we run out of fresh produce. I don’t want to order delivery for just a few items, and we always find other things to get when we cruise the aisles ourselves. At home, we shed outer clothing into washing machine and jump in the shower. Cleaning and putting away the groceries is a job in itself. It’s good that you can discipline yourself to stay home.
I was everything down in the garage, then put it in a basket and bring inside, to the laundry room. I strip down, wrap myself in a towel, head to the shower and let the kids out the groceries up. I completely understand the not wanting to go for small trips as well, I call my mother in law and elderly neighbor, add whatever they might need as well to help prevent a bunch of little trips. I let them know a couple of days in advance so they can get a list going. The discipline is hard, but unfortunately necessary with the children. Of all the things we can’t do, as silly as it sounds, grocery shopping for myself is what I miss the most.